


Work Trip

by Gammarad



Category: Ballet Shoes - Noel Streatfeild
Genre: Acting, Collection: Purimgifts Day 3, Film Industry, Gen, Hollywood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:28:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22874032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gammarad/pseuds/Gammarad
Summary: Winifred works as a secretary. She goes to Hollywood with her boss, a movie producer, and runs into an old acquaintance.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13
Collections: Purimgifts 2020





	Work Trip

**Author's Note:**

  * For [embraidery](https://archiveofourown.org/users/embraidery/gifts).



> Some initial research suggested Pauline had been rescued from the wreck of the Titanic, in 1912. If so, then when she was fifteen at the end of the book, that would have been 1928. 
> 
> Events later in the book seemed to imply something different: that the book ended several years later than that. This story, though, assumes that the novel takes place starting in 1922 and ends in 1928. The story that follows is set 9 years later, in 1937.

  


Winifred was excited about going to Hollywood, of course. She had never expected to get there; but it was surprisingly hard for her to fully enjoy the prospect. She would be there as the secretary to Mr. Harcourt, organizing his meetings and keeping track of all the accounting a producer's office had to accomplish. 

Nothing like her childhood daydreams, the ones she'd known were so unrealistic. She had perhaps had the talent but never the beauty and one needed both, plus a great deal of luck. Winifred had never had luck, either.

Her fiance said all the usual things but she could tell he was not really worried. Even he didn't think she was beautiful enough to have to worry about her with her boss on a transatlantic trip. It was true, though, she didn't have to worry. Though that was because of something about Mr. Harcourt that she couldn't share with her fiance anyway.

The movie they were producing was being cast while they were aboard the transatlantic liner RMS Queen Mary. Less than a week aboard the ship and they were in the United States and aboard a train to California, another three days to travel cross-country, an enormous distance to Winifred. 

When they arrived in Hollywood, the cast had been assembled. The lead actress was to be Felicia Fossil, a name that sent a shiver of recognition through the British secretary when she saw it in the papers she was organizing for Mr. Harcourt's review. Of course it would be her.

For the first two weeks of the stay in Hollywood, Winifred's duties were remarkably similar to what they had been back home in London. Scheduling, speaking with supplicants to the producer's time or money or most often both of those, telephoning the accountants with questions and reminders, and listening to her boss's rants about the ignorance of the people he had to work with. It seemed Americans were especially ignorant, and Winifred was especially necessary to be his listening ear because she was a countrywoman and was the only one who could understand.

And then it happened. The older actress who was playing the leading man's secretary took a step too far in the wrong direction, fell over a piece of mislaid equipment and was injured badly enough to be taken to hospital. "Whatever will we do," the director said, sounding more angry and less sympathetic to the injured woman than Winifred thought fair. Apparently Hollywood movies did not have understudies the way stage plays did. They had stunt doubles, but he dismissed that idea. The actress's stunt double could not deliver the part's lines. She was mostly there to stand around while the lighting was fixed.

Pauline seemed impatient to get on with the scene. Winifred had, very surreptitiously, been watching her, or rather Felicia as she was now named. Someone who didn't know her from childhood would not have noticed, but Winifred could tell. "Let Mr. Harcourt's secretary play the part," she said to the director. 

"I need an actress," the director grumbled. "Fine, we'll do a take. She's dressed for the part at least. Miss?" He didn't even know her name. 

Winifred forbore to give it. She felt a surge of adrenaline. "Lines? Motivation?" An assistant handed her the script. She read it to herself, then aloud. Not too many lines, and a clear intent -- the secretary was in love with her boss, and knew he and this woman, the one Pauline was playing, were involved. She was jealous but knew her own feelings were hopeless and thought perhaps Pauline's character might make him happy. 

Not a difficult character for her to play at all, and she memorized the lines swiftly.

It worked out; she was given a contract and even a credit, once the director had obtained Mr. Harcourt's agreement to her acting in the movie. Winifred had never expected the experience. 

Pauline sat next to her at the premiere. That night, Winifred would be back on a train to New York, then on the ship back to London. "You should stay," Pauline said softly while everyone watched the newsreel.

Winifred looked away from the screen and over at the girl her own age who was a movie star. "What ever for?"

"You're very good and you're completely out of practice. You'll be brilliant once you have a few years of work." The music was loud and Pauline was whispering, but Winifred could hear every word.

"They'll never want a me. There's enough yous," Winifred said. That's how it had always been,

"For leading roles, but you'd be a character actress. And there's a consolation." It surprised Winifred that there was not even a trace of bitterness in Pauline's voice as she spoke on. "I'll be over in ten or fifteen years, and too well known to do the small roles unless it's one they want a lot of attention on. But you'll have work till you're old. More then, even. Nurses and grandmothers and old spinsters and witches, all sorts."

Silence fell as Pauline stopped and the newsreel ended. The music started again as the projectionist changed to the next reel. 

Winifred thought about it until the feature started and then she forgot everything as she was absorbed into the world of the movie. 

Afterward in the car that was taking Mr. Harcourt and her, and one of the young actors he'd extended an invitation to, back to the hotel, Winifred thought about her options as Mr. Harcourt and his young man whispered back and forth. Back to her job that she was good at, her fiance who was reliable -- her job she didn't really enjoy and her fiance who didn't think she was beautiful -- she realized she'd already decided.

The next day found her sending a telegram instead of getting on a train.


End file.
